Bull Moose on Immoderate Centrism
Over at Bull Moose, Marshall Wittman discusses the question of whether "the front-runners for the Republican nomination will be figures who have challenged the prevailing GOP orthodoxy in at least one fundamental way - McCain, Giuliani and Frist." He doesn't add Hagel, but I will.
"If McCain or Giuliani, in particular, gained their party's nomination either one of them would likely attract large number of independent and even Democratic voters," Wittman notes - while obviously holding on to the vast majority of Republicans.
"Will there be donkeys who follow this path of defying the base? The lefties may soon be establishing litmus tests such as signing on to a date for withdrawal from Iraq. There will be immense pressure from the emboldened blogosphere to follow Feingold's lead. That path would be disastrous for the Democrats as it would be portrayed as the 'cut and run' party by the Rovians. How will the leading Democratic contenders respond? And how will Democratic candidates appeal to independents and wayward Republicans? Now that wcould be a worthy 'litmus test' for the party."
Will "defying the base" be the catchphrase of 2008? Will 'Sister Souljah moments' become as common as visits to New Hampshire and Iowa? And how will that change the way the run is run, won, and lost?
I agree with the Moose: "The immoderate centrists will be watching."
posted by JBD @ 10:25 AM
4 comments
4 Comments:
I don’t really see how the war issue could split the Democratic Party (a point I made today over at Wonktron5000 ). So far, Feingold’s campaign has been a comedy of errors and I don’t see it getting much better (and I say this as a fan of the Senator). All of the other nine candidates are immune to the war issue one way or another. Clinton (who is almost a prohibitive front-runner) gets a free pass from liberal groups. Vilsack, Warner, and Richardson are governors and therefore can sidestep the issue. Clark and Obama are explicitly anti-war and have been from the start. Bahy is not going to be nominated for so many reasons, why focus on his pro-war stance? Edwards had a great explanation/apology last year, and it should work fine this year. Kerry and Biden will have the biggest problems with the issue but they are not going to go anywhere in the campaign (I doubt that Biden will even jump in when all is said and done). At best, an anti-war candidate could try to play kingmaker and beat Clinton over the head with the issue but I don’t see that as likely. In the end, I just don’t buy into the idea that a significant number of Democrats will cross party lines, particularly with the Senator from New York on the ticket. Significantly, it is the liberals, not the moderates, who feel alienated. Giuliani was never the left’s best friend and he is tracking right, making a leftwing defection to the GOP unlikely.
This post was eye-opening to me in that it was the first time that my gut instinct was to go with a party not a person. For most of my life, I was basically a Democrat, but always felt I would vote for whatever candidate I agreed with the most - typically centrist Dems, but not always. However, my gut instinct when reading this post was that, even if I were to agree with a centrist Republican on most, I would have a hard time at this point supporting Republican candidates. Most of the items with which I agreed with Republicans - balanced budget, free trade, states rights - seem to be abandoned by the current Republican party. Basically, I would be afraid to support a centrist Republican because I worry the party is no longer dominated by the libertarian version of conservatism but by the big government social planning version of conservatism. How's that for a broad, unfair sweep of a major party? The point is simply that the current administration has made me have a real party identification for the first time in my life, as opposed to just usually agreeing with someone and voting for them.
Just thought I would throw in, as a person who is more left-wing than not, that I have no idea why exactly I am supposed to be voting for Clinton, even though I am repeatedly told I am. It strikes me as nothing more than name recognition. I feel like I am a 19th century Frenchman voting for Napoleon III only because he has the right name. And the first Clinton wasn't exactly the first Napoleon in competence or vision. It would say something about the current state of our democracy if the only people we can elect from 1988 to, possibly, 2016 are Bush, Clinton, Bush, Clinton. It's as if the only thing Americans are able to understand now is a famous name and a pleasant disposition.
Pacatru, I did not mean that individual liberals are giving Senator Clinton a pass (I am as blue as a B.B. King song and she is my seventh choice policy-wise and sixth choice politically). Liberal interest groups give her a free pass, much as conservative groups give Bush a pass. Is every group this way? No, but most major players are.
Phil S, I don’t think we disagree. However, the original post talked about Democrats bolting for a centrist Republican. The power of liberal interest groups is at a very low ebb and centrist Democrats are in the Party’s driver’s seat. If anybody is going to leave the Party, it will be liberals. However, I would be shocked if they went to the GOP (though we would be better off as a nation if both parties again had a liberal and conservative wing). If liberals take off, I see a third party, not Republicans cleaning up.
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